preface

This is a book of review. The core content comes from the summary of Xiaomi's 10th anniversary. In the first half of 2020, my colleagues and I spent about half a year thinking and discussing Xiaomi's entrepreneurial process, and formed a series of conclusions.

My career has experienced more than 30 years of ups and downs. From the initial entrepreneurial attempt in my student days, to the development of general software, e-commerce, games, to the development of mobile Internet tools, cloud services, consumer electronics hardware, IoT (Internet of Things) intelligent devices, and so on, I entered the smart electric vehicle industry last year. As Bob Dylan said in his song when I was young, "The answer is floating in the wind". Along the way, the answers to business thinking in different periods have been reverberating in my mind.

What is the purpose of business, and how to maximize the practical significance of business? My answer is: efficiency. It can bring maximum happiness to the most people.

In the 12 years since its inception, Xiaomi has only done one thing: to transform the traditional manufacturing industry with Internet thinking and methods, to practice and enrich "Internet+manufacturing", to promote the efficiency revolution of the commercial society, to maximize the interests of users and the efficiency of socio-economic operation.

When we set out 12 years ago, my colleagues and I knew a little about manufacturing. All we had was a set of tools called "Internet Thinking". But I still believe that we will have a chance to realize our dream, because I believe in the Internet.

As a technical tool, the Internet has no right or wrong, but its ideals, spirit and methods have been for efficiency, transparency, fairness and inclusiveness since the first day of the Internet.

The so-called Internet spirit is not only seen in the narrow sense of the Internet industry, but also far more than today's common, familiar and intuitive Internet based applications. Some people say that now we have entered the second half of the Internet, and I don't quite agree. In my opinion, the Internet has finally broken away from childhood and started to move towards adolescence. It has truly entered the vast world, enabling everyone and everything.

I have always believed that the Internet should respect people, not shackle them; The Internet should be the driving force of thinking and technology to liberate productive forces, rather than a beggar thy neighbour; The Internet should continue to promote openness and sharing, rather than the digital divide of simple zero sum competition; The Internet should be the cultivator of the overall wealth of society, not just the receiver and distributor of traffic and wealth.

Therefore, the Internet should become a public service. It should serve people transparently. Methods should be published to the public. Data belongs to users. Under the premise of full authorization and protection, participants in the business world and public services can enjoy, be available, and be managed. The key is to give full play to the Internet's advantages of information gathering bandwidth, fast interactive feedback, and digital traceability, manageability, and overall planning, actively integrate with the real economy, and truly shoulder the responsibility of promoting balanced and sustainable economic development and maximizing people's happiness. Only in this way, the Internet is not only a passive digital tool, but also a real digital development engine.

Since 2005, these thoughts have been hovering in my mind, gradually forming the basic method and practical guidance for founding Xiaomi. During more than ten years of exploration, these thoughts and practices have been gradually polished, and a set of rudiments of methodology has been initially formed. Based on the decades of hard work in China's manufacturing industry, this methodology has gradually begun to make progress in the field of "Internet+manufacturing" after continuous practice and improvement, taking advantage of the tide of the times when China's reform and opening up are deepening and economic construction is taking off.

This is my first book on business thinking. I am neither an economist nor a business theorist, so I cannot write a theoretical book. As an engineer and an entrepreneur, I would like to try to summarize and share our thoughts based on Xiaomi's entrepreneurial process, as well as ways to improve and perfect these thoughts. These thoughts must be imperfect, even very simple; These thoughts must not be the only solution to business progress and model innovation. But I believe that for many entrepreneurs and business managers, many of these methods and thinking will have some reference and applicable value. At the same time, I hope that through this book, I can make a centralized sharing and discussion with all Xiaomi colleagues, friends, partners and friends who support the "Xiaomi Mode".

The content of this book is by no means my own thinking. To a large extent, it is a collective work of Xiaomi's founder team, management and many Xiaomi colleagues. Here, I would like to express my sincere thanks to them.

Xiaomi is still very young, and his entrepreneurial thinking has just started. This book is more about Xiaomi's summary of the past 12 years. Facing the future, we still have many problems to think about and practice. I hope that Xiaomi can become a century old enterprise, and I believe that the mode and method of thinking in Xiaomi's entrepreneurial process will be more valuable and far-reaching than Xiaomi itself.

Lei Jun
August 2022